Beginner looking for help finding Sicilian relatives

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mbarboza
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Beginner looking for help finding Sicilian relatives

Post by mbarboza »

Greetings. I am hoping to find my Sicilian relatives. I have a desire to write to them and hopefully establish contact. I know very little about genealogy, and I am looking for help from you all. I don't even know where to start. Here is what I know:

My great grandfather, Steven D'Amico, was born in 1895 in Lercara Friddi, Sicily. His parents were Rosolino D'Amico and Francesca Ferlisi. There's a possibility Rosolino came from a town near Lercara Friddi called Alia in the region of Palermo. Both Steven and his mother, Francesca, came over on the U.S.S. Patria on September 9, 1920 where Francesca's sister, Rosaria, was already living on Elizabeth Street in Brooklyn. Once here in The United States, Steven met and married Annemarie (Anna) Aversa in 1923. Anna was born in Hoboken, New Jersey in 1905. Anna's parents, Salvatore and Rosalia (Caruso) Aversa, came over around 1901 or 1902. Anna's older brother Frank was born in Italy in 1900. He shows up in passenger lists as a baby. Besides Frank, Anna had a brother, Paul, and a sister, Rose, who was the youngest. I believe Paul and Frank ran a millinery shop in downtown Manhattan soon after emigrating here.

There was a fire in Anna and Steven D'Amico's flat in Brooklyn in 1926. Anna and their young son, Rosario, both died at Beth Israel. Steven and their two children, Rosalie and Salvatore (my grandfather), survived the fire. Salvatore was severely burned and lived the rest of his life with disfiguring scars. Steven remarried early the following year to Jenny Kramer who brought her 11 year old son, Jerry, with her. At one point while the kids were growing up, Steven put his mother Francesca into Pilgrim State Hospital in Brentwood, New York for paranoia and dementia. She died there in 1937 at age 83.

Thanks for any help you can offer me!
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Bette
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Re: Beginner looking for help finding Sicilian relatives

Post by Bette »

Attached here is the birth record of Steven; known as Stefano, in the records, born on August 25, 1895, in Lercara Friddi. The record states that his father Rosolino was 48 years old at this time.

https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.3.1/T ... ,249456102

Are you interested in researching this family further? You could continue finding family members and gather more data from the familysearch.org web site.
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Bette
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Re: Beginner looking for help finding Sicilian relatives

Post by Bette »

According to the Italian White Pages telephone directory 0n-line, there are D'Amico's in both Alia and Lercara Friddi.

http://www.paginebianche.it/

It would be difficult to know if any are related to you. With further research, you could determine if there were any siblings left behind in Sicily and then start your writing campaign.
carubia
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Re: Beginner looking for help finding Sicilian relatives

Post by carubia »

They took them from a fire in Brooklyn to Beth Israel in Manhattan?! Wasn't there a closer hospital?
mbarboza
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Re: Beginner looking for help finding Sicilian relatives

Post by mbarboza »

Yes. I'm not sure why they were taken so far for treatment. It does seem strange.
mbarboza
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Re: Beginner looking for help finding Sicilian relatives

Post by mbarboza »

Bette, thank you so much for the birth record and for giving me a couple of websites to start with. I will certainly see what I can find out at familysearch.org and in the Italian White Pages.
mbarboza
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Re: Beginner looking for help finding Sicilian relatives

Post by mbarboza »

Wow! Seeing my great grandfather's birth record is an incredible experience! Wow!
mbarboza
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Re: Beginner looking for help finding Sicilian relatives

Post by mbarboza »

Bette wrote:Attached here is the birth record of Steven; known as Stefano, in the records, born on August 25, 1895, in Lercara Friddi. The record states that his father Rosolino was 48 years old at this time.

https://familysearch.org/pal:/MM9.3.1/T ... ,249456102

Are you interested in researching this family further? You could continue finding family members and gather more data from the familysearch.org web site.
Bette, I think I'm using the search tool wrong at familysearch.org. I don't even seem to be able to pull up the same birth record that you found, no matter how I search for it. Would you be able to give me a quick summary of how you searched to find Stefano's birth record? There must be something I'm overlooking.

And thanks again for your help!
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Bette
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Re: Beginner looking for help finding Sicilian relatives

Post by Bette »

Sure...I'd be happy to. To begin with, there is usually an index at the end of each year of birth records (Nati). These indexes are usually in alphabetical order, but in this particular case, they were in numerical order by the Birth Record number for that year. Be aware that when you use the FamilySearch.org web site, many records require "browsing", as in this case. Here are the instructions (the long version) to find this town and Stefano's birth record.

Go to the web site: https://familysearch.org
Click on the "Search" icon in the center of the page
Scroll down to "Browse All Published Collections" & click on it.
Now you will see the listing of All Historical Record Collections that have been posted to date.
Scroll town to "Italy, Palermo, Termini Imerese, Civil Registration (Tribunale), 1862 - 1910; - Click on it.
Click on Browse through 1,021,654 Images
Now you will see a listing of the Comune or Frazione in this collection.
Scroll down to "Lercara Friddi" - click on it
Now you will see a listing of all the records for this town.
Scroll down to Nati 1885 - 1899 & click on it.
Notice there is an Image Box with a number in it toward the top of your screen. If you highlight that number with your mouse and overwrite it with number 2257, you will be taken to the page of Stefano's birth record. According the the annual index at the end of the year 1895, Stefano's birth record was numbered #350. Now you should see his birth record!!!

When I search for a record, I go to the Index first. In this case, the Index was found on Image Page 2325 and like I said this particular index was in numerical order. You had already given me the year, so that made it easy. Notice in this index that his parents names were listed. This is a gift, because you do not always find the parents' names in the Index. I jot down the Record number, #350 in this case, and then I jump backward by changing the number in the Image box at the top of the screen, until I find Nati record #350, in the year 1895. That about sums it up.

Sorry that these directions are so long. But, I had to check both Palermo links to find Lercara Friddi. And I always navigate this way to see ALL the records that are posted. Any new entries have an asterisk * and new entries are added weekly.
mbarboza
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Re: Beginner looking for help finding Sicilian relatives

Post by mbarboza »

Bette wrote:Sure...I'd be happy to. To begin with, there is usually an index at the end of each year of birth records (Nati). These indexes are usually in alphabetical order, but in this particular case, they were in numerical order by the Birth Record number for that year. Be aware that when you use the FamilySearch.org web site, many records require "browsing", as in this case. Here are the instructions (the long version) to find this town and Stefano's birth record.

Go to the web site: https://familysearch.org
Click on the "Search" icon in the center of the page
Scroll down to "Browse All Published Collections" & click on it.
Now you will see the listing of All Historical Record Collections that have been posted to date.
Scroll town to "Italy, Palermo, Termini Imerese, Civil Registration (Tribunale), 1862 - 1910; - Click on it.
Click on Browse through 1,021,654 Images
Now you will see a listing of the Comune or Frazione in this collection.
Scroll down to "Lercara Friddi" - click on it
Now you will see a listing of all the records for this town.
Scroll down to Nati 1885 - 1899 & click on it.
Notice there is an Image Box with a number in it toward the top of your screen. If you highlight that number with your mouse and overwrite it with number 2257, you will be taken to the page of Stefano's birth record. According the the annual index at the end of the year 1895, Stefano's birth record was numbered #350. Now you should see his birth record!!!

When I search for a record, I go to the Index first. In this case, the Index was found on Image Page 2325 and like I said this particular index was in numerical order. You had already given me the year, so that made it easy. Notice in this index that his parents names were listed. This is a gift, because you do not always find the parents' names in the Index. I jot down the Record number, #350 in this case, and then I jump backward by changing the number in the Image box at the top of the screen, until I find Nati record #350, in the year 1895. That about sums it up.

Sorry that these directions are so long. But, I had to check both Palermo links to find Lercara Friddi. And I always navigate this way to see ALL the records that are posted. Any new entries have an asterisk * and new entries are added weekly.
Thanks so much!
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